“Richard Burgin, a writer, literary editor and retired English professor, died … Oct. 22 after a long battle with Parkinson’s disease. He was 73,” writes Jane Henderson in Sunday’s (11/15) St. Louis Post-Dispatch. “Founder of Boulevard magazine, and the author of 19 books … Mr. Burgin … first made a name for himself as a college student by turning a series of interviews into the 1969 ‘Conversations With Jorge Luis Borges.’ … In 1996, Mr. Burgin took a position in the English department at St. Louis University…. The writer had resisted formal music training as a youth [as] the son of two prominent violinists. His father, also named Richard Burgin, was concertmaster and associate conductor of the Boston Symphony Orchestra; his mother, Ruth Posselt, a soloist…. His knowledge of the classical music world informed some of his fictional plots, including the [1999] novel ‘Ghost Quartet’ [about a composer, set at Tanglewood and in New York City]. Only later would he play jazz piano by ear and compose his own music…. He taught at universities including Tufts and Drexel before coming to St. Louis.”
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